Municipalities across the State of Vermont have worked to
identify and locate "Unidentified Corridors", or Ancient Roads, in their town that have been forgotten. The goal
is to place these old roads on official town maps.

The Hinesburg Selectboard appointed an Ancient Roads Committee to research old town records looking for information
regarding old roads that are no longer in use but were never officially discontinued in Hinesburg. State law dictates
that towns retain the rights to these old roads whether they have remained in use or not.

Since many of these roads were established in the late 1700’s and early 1800’s, the only evidence of their existence
is often old handwritten surveys that are in the town vault. The Ancient Roads Committee has been reading through these
old records and using them to map these old roads.

As a part of this research, the committee is charged with using on-the-ground observations to assess whether there is
any physical evidence of where these roads were located. Once the committee has finished its records and on-the-ground
research, it will present a report to the Selectboard and the Selectboard will hold public hearings to decide which, if
any, of these roads the town wants to retain the rights to.

To learn more about this process in Hinesburg, or to become involved, contact the Town Administrator's office at 482-2096.

HARC conducts research, primarily researching records in the town vault but also including
on-the-ground exploration for selected roads (with prior notification sent to landowners as required by statute).

Spring 2008

Legislature extends deadline by one year to February 10, 2010.

September 2009

HARC presents results of it’s research to a meeting with members of the Trails Committee,
Conservation Commission, and Planning Commission for input regarding desirability of available roads.

November 2009

HARC presents results of research to Selectboard.

November 2009-January 2010

Selectboard decides whether it wants to include any or all of the available roads on our
Highway map submitted to the state in February. A public hearing, with written notice sent to all landowners that
these roads traverse or abut, must be held prior to any decision to either include these roads on the map as class
4 roads or to discontinue any of these roads.

February 10, 2010

The finish line! All class 4 roads and “legal trails” must be included on highway map
submitted to the State.

February 10, 2015

Deadline for reclassifying “unidentified corridors”, otherwise they are automatically
discontinued as of July 1, 2015.

Selectboard Options

Adding some or all of these roads to the town highway map as class 4 roads submitted to the State by
February 10, 2010. Doing so requires that a publicly warned meeting be held with written notification sent
to all landowners that these roads traverse or abut.

Discontinue some of these roads which requires the above noted public hearing.

Doing nothing in terms of adding any of these roads to our highway map in which case they become “unidentified
corridors” until July 1, 2015 when they are automatically discontinued unless the town takes action to reclassify
them prior to that date. Reclassification would likely require having to pay “damages” to landowners.

Mass discontinuance of all ancient roads. This means that you would be discontinuing any roads that are not on
our town highway map submitted annually to the State. This would require the above noted official public hearing.